Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Do you live nearby?
Why don't you start your testimony?
So I have been going to Umbria Arts as well as a lumber yard since within the last year and a half or so.
And having this opportunity and space to be able to connect with the community for a place that I have recently moved to has been an incredible experience and has honestly increased the well-being of my personal life as well as others that I am aware of.
and having the access to the bakery as well as an artistic community has also been a great
presence in the Manny Young Roxborough area where these third spaces are harder and harder to find
and having the opportunity to bring all different types of people from ages as well as backgrounds
has also been incredible for me in terms of the parking it is also echoing what Sloan had said
that it's very easy and there's lots of space and in terms of the lumber and beams itself i have
not seen them moved once while we were there or any different problems interacting with customers
that have been there as well and i just say that i just offer my full support all right
thank you so much for your for your time anyone else in the audience
Planning Commission oh we got sure yes we have a hand up from uh Madeleine Shacumba chair they're
allowed to speak huh Marlene that's not it's not her case Marlene has her hand raised she's the RCO
we also have a hand up from Marlene Schaefer chair okay we'll allow them to speak
Well, I'll miss you.
Thank you.
Hi, could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
I got this right.
Marlene Schleifer.
It's M-A-R-L-E-N-E.
The last name is S-C-H-L-E-I-F-E-R.
I am the current president of Ridge Park Civic Association.
Hold on a minute.
Hold on a minute.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth of nothing?
What's the truth?
Absolutely, sir.
I am the current, actually, long-time president of Ridge Park Civic Association
and its RCO representative.
I am also a 35-year resident of this immediate area.
I have taken the train into town for all that time.
and the issue with being so close to an industrial area for me anyway is that unless you crash your
car you may not have any reason to use any of the businesses on Umbria Street. So I was delighted
to work with Manny on Timber several years ago because I plant trees as well and Steve Ebner
created tree steaks for us. And I am even more thrilled to be able to shop there, which the
Ebner and Feldman families know I love to do. So I have been to the gallery, I have had the bread,
which is delicious. I've participated in the quizos that have been offered as part of the
Civic Association fundraisers. And I'll just give you one quick anecdote, which is that when I
first moved to the area, I wanted to be able to walk to places like this. And there was one grocery
store on Umbria Street. And I went in there and asked for if they had yogurt. And they looked at
me like I was speaking some foreign language. So to be able to go someplace and get coffee and bread
and shop and just enjoy the area is an absolute joy to everybody and many of the people can and
do walk there which is even better so it's a draw to the neighborhood it's something other than
than you know auto parts places and junkyards and it's a perfect use
thank you very much for your time is there anyone else in the audience
Yes, sir. We have a hand up from Madeleine Sucumba.
I said no. I'm waiting for another.
What's that? Okay. All right. No further hands here.
Okay. Thank you. Planning Commission. Thank you, Chairman, and good morning. David Fecto with the City Planning Commission.
chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends a change in zoning at this location
from i2 medium industrial to icmx industrial commercial mixed use this section of the
neighborhood between umbria street and the river still carries its original 1933 zoning the proposed
icmx zoning would allow retail sales and eating and drinking establishments by right the city
planning commission recommends the board grant proposed use variances for retail sales and
eating and drinking establishments thank you mi 2024 007 9799 5100 umbria street i vote yes
with proviso her amended refusal dated march 17 2026. michael johns my vote is yes with proviso
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes, with proviso.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is yes, with proviso.
Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes, with proviso.
Hi, Owen, my vote is yes, with proviso.
Thank you.
Are we okay?
Thank you.
Yeah, I just didn't know she revised it.
I kept looking back and forth.
I was trying to figure out what the two of you, not you.
Oh, yes.
All right.
Thank you very much and good luck.
All right.
Okay, why don't we do
uh number 17. no not so i'm sorry here it is number 16.
mi2025 007 851 2132 montrose street
sean whalen is the attorney
sean whalen here w-h-a-l-e-n right um do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth yes i do could you identify your client a relationship to the property
certainly my client is chris ianavali he is the owner of the property and a right
Certainly. My client is Chris Ionavalli. He is the owner of the property and our vice chair has a few questions for you. Good morning. Have you submitted your documents and exhibits five days in advance of this hearing? Yes, I did. And do you waive the no the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy? Yes, I do. All right. Thank you. You can share your screen and proceed with your case. Thank you.
so while i share my screen as much as there was going on in the last case there is that
little going on in this case so all right so you guys should see
i think you can see my screen at the moment now
I'm not sure what happened. Sorry about that there we go. Is it large enough for you to see now? Yep, so this is an existing single family house.
roughly at the corner of south 22nd street and montrose streets
it is immediately adjacent to the julian abel park right here
what you can see here is kind of an aerial from south 22nd street you can see the park
and then this is the house with the red balloon on it montrose street is this street running along
the left-hand side so you can see existing house with no side yard fully built out and an existing
pilot house and again here's the same aerial from the front so you can see the height of the
properties behind and two houses away also has a third story that is set back
So this property is in an RSA five zoning district. There is no change in you saw it. It's a single family house, so there's no use refusal.
In fact, we have one use refusal, which is for height at 43 feet, six inches instead of 38 feet.
uh i believe that this is correct as i just testified although this is a bit of a technical
refusal in the sense that we are not attempting to install a an additional floor which is what
how l and i reviews this we are attempting to install a pergola and the problem is pergola is
not mentioned at all in the zoning code and so the the only way that l and i can review it
The way that Ellen I has chosen to review it over time is just as a full second full additional floor. However, we're not having a solid roof. There are no walls. There's no additional insulation or anything like that. I'll show you what it is.
So this is the original zoning plan, and I would suggest, I don't know if SOSNA is on today, they said they would be, I would suggest that this application worked the way the RCO process is supposed to work.
We came forward, let me see if I can, this, we came forward originally, so the hardship here is my client purchased the property in the spring of 2023.
There's essentially no rear yard here. It's a small property, 840 square feet. The rear patio area essentially just houses the trash cans and recycling. So the entire outdoor space while he has the park, you know, the public park next door, the entire outdoor space for this home was the pilot house. And I think as many of us have suffered recently, you know, the summers have rendered, sorry, not the pilot house, the roof deck.
the pi the summers have rendered the roof decks kind of unusable throughout the city just given
the heat and that's his only outdoor space so what we originally proposed is what you see here on the
screen in front of you we went in front of the sasna arc committee they liked the idea of a
pergola and actually several of them thought about doing one themselves although they they
had a lot of questions and wanted this kind of scaled back and so what we did in working with
their art community was significantly reduced the size the total size of the pergola so what you see
here is essentially what it would be it's fixed slat at the roof just trying to break up that
direct sunlight no walls on the side no intention to put on the walls my understanding is we would
need another variance if we tried to actually enclose this so it's not a risk of you know
kind of a Trojan horse. So now what we have is we have a 10-foot setback of the
So now what we have is we have a 10 foot setback of the, you know, from the original, the original was set back five feet, we set back now and what we're proposing the pergola 10 feet from the street frontage, so it's no longer visible from the street frontage whatsoever.
and we also pulled it back from the side of the property here kind of along the adjacent wall of
the park we pulled that back a foot and a half in order to again complete you know really reduce the
sight lines of that and kind of scale it back from the use of an intrusion into anyone else's
property. Now, again, there's no issue with anyone else's light or air. As I originally
went through, the pergola will be up here. It doesn't impact the park in any way with
the trees. And if you look at the properties in the rear, there's a rear alley with these
trees and the height of the buildings behind it these are all rm1 most mostly apartments
um they are unaffected by this additional height and again it would just be breaking up it's like
tree branches essentially um so i have the original plans and the render and the revised
plans that we submitted uh so because we worked with sosna uh sosna voted unanimously in favor to
support the project again they they were i think what you know completely against it at the at the
art committee meeting then we went forward with the proposed revisions that they wanted you know
with the open slats no walls all of that and they voted unanimously in favor um so they advised me
yesterday which i didn't know they did this i guess i've never had a unanimous vote before
that they don't uh they don't prepare a letter and submit a letter uh when they actually vote
unanimously because i figure it's self-explanatory um i did receive a letter yesterday uh from the
executive director which i appreciate from nowak uh they voted uh two to zero
to oppose the project um and essentially i'm happy to go through the the bases of it essentially
their assumption is uh that this is an additional floor and that we're trying to just
get extra height okay um again the hardship here is that the the home as is as it is existing
has no outdoor space so when the owner bought it the outdoor space the only outdoor space is
the roof deck which he has found unusable and therefore is trying to uh you know do the least
minimum variance what what's the least minimum thing he can do to kind of break up that direct
heat and sunlight instead of building an upper floor there with air conditioning and fans and
this kind of stuff what could he do and this is um you know what we believe meets that hardship
so i can call him he is on chris ianavali
he texted me that he is on so
last name is i a n
he says he's on do we see him oh can you hear me yes we can sir would you please state your name
yes my name is christopher patrick ion available c-h-r-i-s-t-o-p-h-e-r middle name is patrick
p-a-t-r-i-c-k last name is iana vale i-a-n-o b like victor a-l-e yes i do counsel counsel
thank you mr mr you're here as the owner of the property today
correct i think he i think he's i think he's might have two may have two
can you turn off one of you can turn off one of your devices
oh is there an echo here uh
i'm only showing one device um i'll try to i'll try to mute and then unmute myself i guess to
mitigate okay okay i only okay i only have a couple quick questions for you
so you're here as the property owner you just stated did you hear all of the testimony i already
presented he's got on mute he's got a mute on mute now you're muted yes you did chris you heard all
You heard all of the testimony that I presented?
you heard all the testimony that i presented yes and
And do you believe it to be true and correct to the best of your information, knowledge, and belief?
And would you adopt that testimony as your own?
Thank you.
Thank you.
Questions from the board?
And the hardship is?
The hardship is twofold.
it's first that the house as built my my client did not build this house he he bought this house
what you're seeing and why it looks so new is he ran into significant problems with the home and
had to completely remediate it and deal with issues of mold and and so that's why it looks
all newly sighted and everything he did not build this house he bought it as built again it has no
outdoor space and so since it has no outdoor space he bought it with the roof deck being his outdoor
space and that is the hardship is that he's unable to use the roof deck given the direct sunlight and
heat in the summertime and so in order to overcome that hardship of not being able to use that roof
deck and have outdoor space for his family what he's trying to do is figure out the least intrusive
way that he can break up that direct sunlight again not have fans up there not have uh you know
full-time sunscreens and things like that and so that's the hardship that he's trying to overcome
is the inability to use any outdoor space at the property okay and what's the height uh the total
height of the building is less than 38 feet so the total height as shown here would be 43 feet
six inches it's the same height as the existing pilot house all right thank you any other questions
yeah well yeah you you say there's no outdoor space but this rendering looks like there's a
rear yard i'm not notwithstanding you have this huge deck upstairs but yes no so there's an eight
foot rear yard which essentially houses just the trash cans and the recycling bin and there's no
other usable space back there because what you have it looks larger than it is because there's
an alleyway between these properties and the properties on the uh on the opposite side of
that alleyway yeah so but there is outdoor space so you know just it's semantics sort of i mean
most of the houses in south fully probably only have a eight foot backyard um so that's not
uncommon for houses in in in this part of philadelphia um so so that's just a point of
comment actually certainly understood and this was something we discussed with sosna
and i agree with their determination that uh this this is something that they think will proliferate
and is warranted throughout the neighborhoods of south philly other questions yeah how um
um i guess what is the distance of the space between the pergola and the pilot house like
because it looks like in this in this depiction that the pilot house is under the pergola correct
uh no so the pergola goes up to i i can pull up sorry i i went over the uh the plan here um
the pergola goes up to and surrounds the existing pilot house so there's no there's no change to the
pilot house or any of the existing construction well it's the same height and and to a certain
degree as the pilot house yes it'll be the same height as the pilot house okay thank you and again
just because i know there is some concern on the part of uh noak that this was essentially a trojan
horse to build an additional floor it is my understanding and speaking with l and i if we
wanted to enclose this in any way it would require a new variance that would be an additional
issue but we'd be happy to you know entertain any proviso that that's that's not what's intended here